As you can read elsewhere in the newsletter, our spring meeting will be at
Butler University in a few weeks. We will be featuring a panel discussion of
effective and easy assessment programs for mathematics majors, and Erica Flapan,
of Pomona College, will be our keynote speaker. She will be talking about
connections between chemistry and topology in one talk, and about her research
in knot theory in a second talk.

We also have an wide range of contributed faculty talks on the program, and a
classroom software workshop. I think that everyone should all find be able to
find something to match their mathematical taste!

As usual, we will have quite a few program items of interest to our
undergraduates, including the Friendly Competition and a game theory workshop
being led by David Housman. This is an excellent opportunity to bring your
students to a meeting. And, as always, we encourage you to invite your students
to give talks at the meeting. This is a very friendly environment for
undergraduates to have this experience.

Please note that registration for the ICMC will be done on-line through the
section's website. We are hoping that this will ease some of the congestion and
confusion during the spring meeting registration. If it is successful, and
well-received, we will be looking to begin pre-registering on-line for
attendance at the meeting itself in the next year or so.

I was very pleased to see all of the campus news that was in the fall
newsletter. I encourage you to continue to send items to John for the
newsletters. I know that things are always changing on our campuses (at least on
mine) and is really nice to be able to know what is going on elsewhere.

I'm pleased to tell you that the MAA has finally published a book recording
the history and the problems from the Indiana College Mathematics Competition.
This has been a goal of several of us for many years, and I hope that many
positive things happen for the section because of its publication.

I'm looking forward to seeing you at Butler University in a few weeks.

SPRING MEETING PROGRAM (TENTATIVE)

Butler University Indianapolis, Indiana Friday and Saturday,
March 28-29, 2003

Over the past five years pressure from many sides has been building
on higher education to join the accountability movement. This usually
translates into something called outcomes assessment or assessment of
student learning. For many different reasons faculty have tended to resist
the pressure, but to little avail. The movement just keeps on coming. For
the past decade the MAA has taken the lead among disciplinary organizations
in promoting the idea that, if assessment is not going to go away, it is
preferable to have a faculty-driven program rather than one imposed from the
outside. The MAAfs current project is one of providing support for
mathematics departments as they develop their assessment programs. This
effort is backed by a $500,000, three-year NSF-funded grant awarded to the
MAA. The project is entitled Supporting Assessment in Undergraduate
Mathematics (SAUM). It includes a series of national workshops, forums at
Section meetings, a volume of case studies and a website for information
about assessment. A link to the website can be found at www.maa.org. Todays
forum will be presented in three parts (one-half hour each). First, Bill
Marion, a member of the SAUM Steering Committee, will talk about the
national effort. Second, two local members of the Indiana Section will
describe their own assessment efforts. Third, we will open the discussion to
the audience. One of the key issues in this part of the forum will be to
talk about what both you and we can do.

Stereochemistry is the study of the 3-dimensional structure of
molecules, and topology is the study of those properties of geometric
objects that are invariant under deformations. It is not obvious that these
two fields have anything in common. In fact, not long ago there was little
communication between researchers in these two areas. Prior to forty years
ago, analyzing the topological properties of existing molecular structures
was not very interesting, because as topological objects, the graphs of all
of the molecular structures known at the time could be deformed into a
plane. Thus understanding the stereochemistry of a molecule only required
the evaluation of its geometry and not its topology. Recently, knots and
links and other non-planar molecules have been synthesized whose structures
and properties come from their topology as well as their geometry. These
molecules are often large enough that they no longer have the rigidity that
is characteristic of small molecules; so understanding their deformations is
an important part of understanding their structure. In this talk we will
discuss how topology can be used to help us analyze the symmetries of such
flexible molecules.

As an MCM judge with 11 years tenure, I have seen several modeling
problems of variable quality and many "models" of yet more variable quality.
From these experiences, I will discuss criteria for a good modeling problem
as well as the components of a quality solution. Good problems beget good
models thus facilitating the teaching of good modeling practices. Audience
participation will be solicited.

A new numerical approximation scheme based on the spectral type of
Clenshaw-Curtis Quadrature is investigated for Fredholm Integral Equation of
the second kind x(t)+ k(t,s)x(s)ds = y(t) whose kernel k(t,s) is either
discontinuous or non-smooth along the main diagonal, would be presented.
Numerical example implemented by this scheme for Schroedinger Equation would
be shown.

10:20-10:40 History of Mathematics in the Middle
East Morteza Seddighin, Indiana University  East

We will discuss the contribution of Middle East to development of
mathematical knowledge both before and after Islam. This includes the
mathematical work of various civilizations such as Sumerians, Akkadians, and
Babylonians from 3500 BC to 200 BC in Mesopotamia. We will also look at the
work of Arabic/Islamic mathematicians in the period between eight century
and middle of fifteenth century. In particular we will discuss the work of
mathematicians such Al- Khwarizmi and Omar Khayyam.

10:40-11:00 BREAK

11:00-11:20 Is There Really any Mathematics in Graph
Theory? Chip Vandell, IPFW

For many people the mention of graph theory conjures up pictures of
dots and lines scribbled on restaurant napkins. A friend once described it
as: "lots of fun, but not much mathematics going on." In this talk we will
look at a graph theory problem which is relatively easy to get into, but
requires different mathematical techniques to solve its various
subproblems.

There is a remarkable connection between representations of the
symmetric group and symmetric multivariable polynomials (polynomials that
are unchanged when the variables are permuted). This correspondence, in
which characters of irreducible representations are mapped to Schur
functions, allows the combinatorics of symmetric functions to be used to
solve representation theoretic problems. This talk will provide an
introduction to this beautiful combinatorial world, introducing symmetric
functions, tableaux, Schur functions, plethysm, and the Robinson- Schensted
correspondence.

In a classical graph colouring problem the vertices of a graph are
properly coloured if no adjacent vertices have the same colour. In a list
colouring problem each vertex has an associated list of colours that can be
used in the colouring. We improve the lower bound on the number of vertices
that can be properly coloured from given lists.

Session 2 (Gallahue Hall 105)

9:45-10:15 Contest Solutions

10:20-10:30 Student Talk

10:35-10:45 Student Talk

10:45-11:00 BREAK

11:00-12:00 Student Workshop, Part 1: A Beautiful
Mind: Some Game Theory of John Nash David Housman, Goshen College

The game of Hex, equilibria in strategic games, and a solution to the
bargaining problem are three contributions that John Nash made to the theory
of games. Participants will play some games and learn about Nash's
associated contributions.

Please join us for a demonstration of MyMathLab.com, an online
teaching and learning tool designed to accompany all major Addison-Wesley
mathematics textbooks. Enhanced by interactive Java applets, animations, and
video and audio content, MyMathLab offers algorithmically generated
tutorials and testing tracked in a nationally hosted course-management
system. A faculty advocate will be on hand to answer questions about the
incorporation of this program into the classroom.

10:45-11:00 BREAK

11:00-11:20 Problem Solving with Computers Young
Lee, Manchester College

A new temporary course that I proposed and taught at Manchester
College, called Problem Solving with Computers, discusses practical and
analytical methods of using computers to solve problems. These methods
include Maple, Matlab, spreadsheets, and elementary C++ programming
techniques. The use of spreadsheet-based sampling experiment is excellent
for introducing the basic concepts of new topics. The graphical visual aids
and intuitive commands associated with symbolic computation engage students'
interest in the problems that they solve. Programming in C++ or Matlab
clarifies the details of the numerical methods that they apply and
encourages them to explore active investigation of such methods. This talk
will discuss using computers to learn critical-thinking skills,
computational techniques, and analytical ability as well as recent changes
in our beliefs about teaching and learning with computer integrated
models.

The generation of large (at least 100-digit) prime numbers is at the
heart of many modern computing applications such as public-key encryption.
The elementary methods used for telling whether small integers are prime,
such as checking for divisors less than the square root of the integer,
become computationally infeasible for larger integers. If we are given a
large integer, how do we tell if it is prime in a fast and efficient way? In
this talk, we will address this question with a brief tour of a few
important tests for primality. We will also take a look at the AKS
algorithm published in August 2002 that solves the centuries-old problem of
finding a deterministic, unconditional, polynomial-time algorithm for
deciding whether an integer is prime.

11:50-12:10 Mobius Transformations and Ellipses
Adam Coffman, IPFW

The image of an ellipse under a Mobius transformation of the plane is
not necessarily an ellipse. I will show some pictures that demonstrate what
the image could be, and establish under which conditions the image is
another ellipse.

The group of symmetries of a molecule plays a role in predicting the
molecule's behavior. For a rigid molecule, this symmetry group is well
defined and straight forward to evaluate. In order to analyze the symmetries
of a flexible molecule, Jon Simon introduced the topological symmetry group
of a graph embedded in 3-space. We define the Topological Symmetry Group
of an embedded graph G as the group of those
automorphisms of the vertices of G which can be
induced by some deformation of G in space.

In 1938, Frucht showed that every finite group is the automorphism group
of some graph. In contrast, we show that not every finite group can be the
topological symmetry group of some graph embedded in 3-space. This result
naturally leads to the question of which groups can be the topological
symmetry group of some embedded graph. We answer this question for the class
of 3-connected graphs.

(From the North) Take I-865 East to I-465 East. Take I-465 East to
Exit 31 - Meridian Street. Turn right on Meridian Street; travel to 46th
Street. Turn right on 46th Street. 46th Street leads directly to campus.

(From the North on I-69) Take I-465 West to Exit 31 - Meridian
Street. Turn left on Meridian Street; travel to 46th Street. Turn right on
46th Street. 46th Street leads directly to campus.

(From the South on I-65) Take Exit 113 - Meridian Street (North).
Turn right on Meridian Street; travel to 46th Street. Turn left on 46th
Street. 46th Street leads directly to campus.

(From the Southeast on I-74) Take I-465 West to I-65 North. Take
Exit 113 - Meridian Street (North). Turn right on Meridian Street; travel to
46th Street. Turn left on 46th Street. 46th Street leads directly to campus.

(From the East on I-70) Take I-65 North to Exit 113 - Meridian
Street (North). Turn right on Meridian Street; travel to 46th Street. Turn
left on 46th Street. 46th Street leads directly to campus.

(From the West on I-70) Take I-465 North to Exit 17 - 38th Street.
Turn right on 38th Street; travel to Clarendon Road (You will pass a shopping
mall and the Indianapolis Museum of Art). Turn left on Clarendon Road
(Clarendon Road is immediately past Crown Hill Cemetery). Travel to Hampton
Drive; turn right. At the next stop sign, turn left onto Sunset Avenue. Travel
to the stop sign at 46th Street. Turn left into the one-way traffic roundabout
at the main campus entrance.

(From the West on I-74) Take I-465 North to Exit 17 - 38th Street.
Turn right on 38th Street; travel to Clarendon Road (You will pass a shopping
mall and the Indianapolis Museum of Art). Turn left on Clarendon Road
(Clarendon Road is immediately past Crown Hill Cemetery). Travel to Hampton
Drive; turn right. At the next stop sign, turn left onto Sunset Avenue. Travel
to the stop sign at 46th Street. Turn left into the one-way traffic roundabout
at the main campus entrance.

Parking on Campus

On Saturday, March 29, 2003 participants can park in any parking space on
campus. There is no restricted parking on Saturdays and Sundays. On Friday,
March 28, 2003 participants should park in the Clowes Memorial Hall parking lot
or on Lake Road. If these are full then you can park in any available parking
space. If you get a parking ticket on Friday give it to Amos Carpenter.

Meeting Registration

The MAA meeting will take place in Gallahue Hall. Registration will be held
in the Atrium on the first floor of Gallahue Hall and will begin at 2:30 p.m. on
Friday and 8:00 a.m. on Saturday. A meeting registration fee of $ 10.00 will be
collected from each non-student participant. There is no registration fee for
students. All participants, including students, are expected to sign-in at the
registration table. Please note that Butler University is a smoke free
environment.

Meal Reservations

Meals will be served in the Atherton Union, Reilly Room. The Friday dinner
will cost $17.00 per person and the Saturday lunch will cost $8.50 per person.
For the dinner there will be a choice of either Chicken Jardine or Florentine
Stuffed Manicotti each to be served with tossed salad, dinner rolls, roasted
garlic mashed potatoes, green beans almondine, cheesecake with a topping, ice
water, iced tea, regular and decaffeinated coffee. The lunch will be a deli
buffet consisting of smoked turkey, ham, tuna salad, swiss cheese, cheddar
cheese, cole slaw, fresh fruit salad, and cookies. Advanced reservation is
required. Reservation for the meals may be made no later than 12:00 noon,
Monday, March 17, 2003 in one of the following ways:

Call Teri Amberger at (317)940-9521 or Amos Carpenter at (317)940-9436.

Send an e-mail message to Teri Amberger at tamberge@butler.edu. E-mail reservations
will be acknowledged by e-mail.

When making your reservation you should say whether you want the Chicken
Jardine or the Florentine Stuffed Manicotti.

Accommodations

Blocked rooms (with discounts) have been negotiated with the following
hotels:

The Indiana Section of the MAA awards free memberships to all students who
present papers at an Indiana Section meeting. The recipients of these
memberships are allowed to select any one journal. In case the prize winner is
already a member, an MAA-published book can be substituted for the membership

2003 ICMC

All colleges and universities throughout the state are invited to register
three-member teams of undergraduate students to compete in the Indiana
Mathematics Competition (ICMC). This year's contest will mark the 38th
anniversary of the competition. It will take place at Butler University in
conjunction with the Indiana Section Spring Meeting.

The competition will be held Friday afternoon, March 28, starting with
on-site registration from 3:00-4:00pm. A briefing session on the competition
will begin at 4:00pm and the test will be administered from 4:15-6:15pm
immediately following the briefing. The math competition is held on Friday
afternoon so that students have the opportunity to fully participate in the MAA
meeting held during Friday evening and all day Saturday. The test will be graded
overnight and the winning teams announced at the business meeting on Saturday
afternoon.

The ICMC is designed as a team competition, with members of teh team working
together on the test and turning in a single team solution for each problem
attempted. No books, calculators, computers, slide rules, rulers, compasses, or
other such aides will be allowed in the testing rooms. The contest questions are
designed in such a way that a calculator provides no significant advantage to
any team.

Each school may enter as many teams as desired; those teams must register in
advance. There is a $5.00 registration fee per team. Team members wishing to
attend teh dinner and luncheon must also make reservations. (See ACCOMODATIONS
and MEAL RESERVATIONS above.)

It is strongly recommended that teams pre-register for ICMC, so that
the host institution can reserve enough rooms for the contest. Teams that
pre-register will be guaranteed admission to the contest, while those teams that
register on-site will be granted admission provided that space is available.

The MAA's Professional Enhancement Program (PREP) will offer a wide variety
of workshops during summer 2003. PREP workshops offer you the chance to spend a
few days exploring topics of mutual interest with colleagues from other
institutions, with experienced leaders to guide the group towards a deeper
understanding and broader perspective. Most of the cost of attending a PREP
workshop is covered by the program, so what are you waiting for? Visit the PREP
web site, http://www.maa.org/prep to
see this year's schedule and to obtain registration materials.

Preparing Mathematicians to Educate Teachers

A growing set of national reports calls for better preparation of the
nation's mathematics teachers by mathematics faculty. To help meet this need,
the MAA is organizing a multifaceted program, Preparing Mathematicians to
Educate Teachers (PMET). The PMET program will have three major components:

Faculty Training: Workshops of varying duration throughout the year and
minicourses at professional meetings;

Information and Resources: Articles in professional journals, panels at
meetings, multimedia web sites and hard-copy material to support faculty
instruction for teachers;

Mini-grants and Regional Networks: To nurture and support grassroots
innovation in teacher education on individual campuses. The initial regional
networks will be in California, New York, North Carolina, Nebraska, and Ohio.

An extensive article on the PMET program and how MAA members can
participate will appear in the March issue of FOCUS.

Project NExT faculty who are interested in attending a PMET workshop should
visit the PMET web site for more information. http://www.maa.org/pmet

SECTION NEWS

Ball State University

The Mathematical Sciences Department welcomes Dr. Beverly Hartter from
Illinois State University. Dr. Hartter has accepted a tenure-track position in
mathematics education.

Earham College

The Mathematics Department reports strong participation in the ICM/MCM
contest this year, with five teams competing.

Indiana University Northwest

The IUN Department of Mathematics and Actuarial Science is proud to announce
that Dr. Iztok Hozo is this year recipient of the Indiana University Founder's
Award for excellence in teaching.

The department has hired Dr. Bogdan Vajiac (Ph. D., University of Notre Dame)
as an assistant professor with expertise in geometry and topology.

Mr.William Odefey (M.A, Indiana University) and Ms. Stela Pudar-Hozo (Post
Baccalaureate Certificate,Purdue University and Equivalent of M.A.,Indiana
University) have joined the department as lecturers. Mr. Odefey's expertise is
in actuarial science and Ms. Pudar-Hozo's in statistics.

Dr. Le Roy Peterson has retired after 31 years and Dr. John Synowiec has
retired after 29 years with the Department.

IUN Math Club will sponsor a group of students to attend the 38th Annual
Indiana College Math Competition at Butler University.

IUPUI

It is with the deepest sorrow that we inform you of the untimely passing of
our dear colleague and friend Yuri Abramovich. Last night, on February 5, at
9:45 PM in the IU Hospital, surrounded by his family, doctors and friends, Yuri
succumbed to Multiple Myeloma, a terrible disease that he has been battling with
for the past four years. Our heart-felt condolences to his wife, Alla, and his
two daughters, Julia and Jane.

In memory of Yuri, the Department has established the Yuri Abramovich
Memorial Scholarship. Memorial contributions to this scholarship fund may be
made to the IUPUI Department of Mathematical Sciences.

Indiana University South Bend

The Mathematics Department is pleased to report that a B.S. program in
actuarial science has recently been approved.

Purdue University

Purdue West Lafayette's Departments of Mathematics and Statistics anticipate
the renewal of their VIGRE grant which will bring continuing support for
undergraduate research, graduate students, and postdoctoral faculty for two more
years.

Jean E. Rubin, Professor of Mathematics at Purdue, West Lafayette, died
October 25, 2002 in Lafayette Indiana. After earning her Ph.D. from Stanford in
1955, she taught at Oregon and Michigan State before going to Purdue in 1967.
She was the author of more than 40 research papers and five books on set theory.
Much of her research centered on questions related to the axiom of choice. In
addition to her research, her colleagues remember her untiring service to the
Math Department, especially her work to obtain scholarships for talented
undergraduate math majors. (With that in mind, a Jean E. Rubin Memorial
Scholarship Fund has been set up; checks made out to "Purdue Foundation" with a
note that it is for this fund can be sent to the Head, Department of Mathematics
to honor her memory.) Surviving with her husband, Herman Rubin, Professor of
Statistics at Purdue, are a son, Arthur L. Rubin of Brea, California, and a
daughter, Leonore A. Findsen of Orlando, Florida.

Purdue University Calumet

After a two-year hiatus the Purdue University Calumet Annual High School
Mathematics Competition is back. This year it will be held on Saturday, March
29. Teams of three students compete solving problems where the problems do not
require calculus or calculators. Each team of three will have two hours to
submit solutions to 12-14 problems where the explaination of the solution is as
important as the solution itself. High schools that are interested in competing
should contact Betty Jahr-Schaffrath at the Department of Mathematics, Computer
Science and Statistics, Purdue University Calumet, 2200 169th Street, Hammond,
IN 46323. If additional information is desired Professor Schaffrath can be
contacted at (219)989-2272 or by email at schaffra@calumet.purdue.edu. Deadline
for applications is March 14.

Valparaiso University

Valparaiso University has
established a new major in Actuarial Science. Faculty from the
mathematics,economics, finance, and information & decision sciences
departments serve on the administrative committee forthe major, including
mathematicians Kim Pearson and David Hull. Student response has been
enthusiastic andthe program already has 5 majors, including Briana Ehrhardt,
who will complete a double major in actuarial science and
mathematics.